'My apologies for keeping you out so late Miss Stakehouse but I was held up on my last job and as this was kind of a last minute thing plus my truck breaking down like it did, well I was lucky to be able to get here at all.' Sookie smiled, 'I appreciate you coming at short notice Mr Draper. As I explained on the phone I wanted to get you to take a look at the boundaries just to make sure that everything was in order. Here is the deed to the property with everything marked out clearly but I wanted to confirm that it is all correct, you see I was away for a time and the umm… person looking after the place got a new deed made up and well, I just wanted to check that it was correct. I am planning on some work in the future and need to tie up all the paper work first.'
While Sookie had been waiting for Roger Draper, the surveyor she had contacted to arrive, she had planned out in her head what she would say as a reason for the appointment with him. She didn't want to particularly say what she was up to, not until she had spoken to Bill and hopefully gotten his go ahead but at the same time she knew that it was necessary to get things checked. When Eric had given her back the deed to her house she had noticed that he had gotten a new one made and had a survey completed so she did want to check that his was accurate and that there wasn't anything wrong with the paper work. When it came to Eric she wouldn't put it past him to do something underhanded like paying or glamouring someone into altering boundary lines for his own nefarious purposes. Better to be safe than sorry and in her own way she was kind of hoping that vigilance with this would impress Bill and maybe show him how serious she was about her project.
By the time that Roger had finished doing whatever it was that surveyors did it was well and truly dark. How he could see to use his instruments she didn't know and his explanation of night vision scopes and other technical equipment went right above her but she was relieved to have him confirm that it all looked to be fine and that she had nothing to worry about. With a promise of a cheque in the mail and extra to cover his fee and the inconvenience for the short notice, he left Sookie to make her way back through the small forest at the back of her house but then she changed her mind. It was now or never, and with the deed in her dress pocket she thought what the heck, she might as well trust her luck and head on over to see Bill, at least then she would know one way or another whether all her plans would be in vain.
It was just lucky that she had bought a torch with her so that she could see but even so, the small over grown track through the scrub was uneven and was taking her a while to pick her way through it, longer than she really wanted to take as it was getting quite late now and for some reason she was feeling uneasy.
The path skirted around the thickest part of the wood and for a while ran alongside the boundary between her and Bill's property. Looking over through the trees she caught glimpses of his house in the distance and a pang of nostalgia hit her.
She thought back to the time that she would have simply scooted through the garden and cemetery and straight to Bill's house to find him on the porch, his blue eyes shining in the moonlight as he felt her coming and he waited impatiently for her. For a moment she thought that she saw movement on his front porch but told herself that she was just fantasising, after all what would he be doing out on his porch right now, he probably had much better things to do with Katie. They were probably out to dinner; he might even have taken her to that fancy French restaurant where he had proposed to her.
Note to brain, do not mention that again, she said to herself as unexpected tears stung her eyes bought on by her sudden fit of melancholy and regret. 'Oh Bill,' she said out loud sighing at the thought of his face as he sat there and asked her to marry him.
The pathway had veered off to the right away from the boundary and his house was lost to sight as she sighed again, 'Bill how could I have been so stupid?' 'Sookie?' the voice coming closer to her through the darkness startled her and she jumped. 'Bill?' she asked, peering into the shadows, 'is that you?' 'Sookie I just got your message…' 'Bill I was coming over to see you…' they both spoke at the same time. There was an uncomfortable pause before they both simultaneously started again. 'Sorry what were you going to say…' 'After you ladies first…' Another awkward pause ensued. 'Sookie go ahead, I insist.' She gulped and thought well it's now or never.
Bill had been sitting on the porch thinking but it was getting him nowhere and he was getting restless so he decided to go for a walk. Just as so many times in the past when he would patrol the woods watching to make sure that Sookie was safe, he took to the path that turned off the track leading directly to her house and wandered along the side of the wood instead. Many was the time that he had completed the circumventive route, out of sight and mind, covertly guarding her and making sure she was safe but the length of the weeds that were tall now told the tale of just how long his services had gone unrequired and unwanted.
He was mooching along considering what he was going to do when he heard a noise up ahead of him on the path. To anyone else it would have been just the nightly noise of the woods or perhaps a trick of the wind but not to his keen vampire hearing. No, Bill heard a very distinctive sigh then words that he had thought he had given up the right to hear spoken long ago, he heard Sookie's unmistakeable voice saying his name and then he heard her other comment. To say he was surprised was an understatement and for a moment he really did think that it was wishful thinking but then he felt that small immeasurable pull mixed with something else, hope. At the same time he did wonder what the hell she was doing out at this time of night and why was she walking along this path.
For one fleeting moment he considered turning around and heading home but then he vamped up, he couldn't bear to go through yet another disappointment and he knew what he needed to ask of her could push her to the brink with no turning back. Dare he ask, could he even broach the subject of her blood with her, remembering the last time they had talked about it and the bitter words that conversation had evoked? He had no rights as far as she was concerned, those he had forfeited a long time ago and yet there was something in him that told him to go on, nothing ventured nothing gained he had been brought up to believe. Worst case scenario it would put yet another wedge in their very fragile relationship, if you could even call it that. But it didn't stop him. He had to go on now that he had made up his mind and as per usual he found himself in a position that he really would have preferred to never want think about, let alone be part of.
'Bill,' Sookie looked up at him and caught the soft gleam in his eyes but she couldn't quite get words out under his gaze. 'What is it Sookie,' he asked gently. 'I, I was wondering,' she swallowed. This was so hard, harder than she thought. Dam it, she was tongue tied and nearly trembling suddenly. Just being this close to him and she could smell him, that same familiar scent of him. Her heart was racing and she was losing a grip on her thoughts. Why did he always have this effect on her, what was it about him. It wasn't just his vampireness as she put it, there was something, something else that was bigger was intangible.
She had looked up the word in her online dictionary once not long after they had met and she had thought that it described it perfectly – elusive, ethereal, indefinable and indescribable. That was it, whatever he had and whatever the effect that he had on her was indescribable but she did know one thing for certain whenever he was around, she felt like she had come home, like she knew him, recognised something in him that she couldn't name or make sense of but never the less missed desperately when she wasn't around it. It was the same kind of comfort that she got from Grans or well, from Niall she suddenly thought oddly enough, like family.
'You were wondering what Sookie?' Bill said encouragingly. 'Well I know this may sound like a stupid idea and you can shoot me down in flames Bill but I want to subdivide my land and build a kind of gated family community for any one that wants to move here and embrace yours and Sam's way of living,' she said all in a rush. 'Of course it would be vampire friendly and I was wondering, seeing how my land abuts yours that well, I know I have to get your permission and approval and I sort of wondered what you think of the idea?'
She stood there breathing hard waiting for his reaction. Her heart was racing as she scanned his face for any outward sign of approval or disapproval and was on the verge of tears when she saw that he shook his head. Her shoulders slumped and her eyes stang.
He must hate the idea.
